Tolliver was grim. “Aye aye, sir.” He knew cowardice when he saw it.
Boland stood with me in the corridor, uncertain. I pointed to the comm room. “Back to work.” Head down, he brushed past.
Four minutes, before I must pass my next sentence of death. I dropped into my seat, plotted coordinates over and again until I was sure I had them right. Then I picked up the caller.
“Trafalgar to Fuser Seven, respond.”
It had to be Seven. Kevin Arnweil had twice managed to avoid destruction while his ship caterwauled, but. the five unsupervised cadets were still the weakest link in my chain. Their luck couldn’t last.
I had to use them before it was too late.
Seven was closer; only twenty-four seconds for my voice to reach them.
“Fuser Seven responding. Cadet Kevin Arnweil reporting, sir.” By the book. The boy had come far from the youngster who wailed over the stiffened body of his friend Dustin.
“Mr. Arnweil, you’re to Fuse once more.” I swallowed, then continued smoothly. “These coordinates will put you just outside the B’n Auba Zone, near the Sun.” A small deceit. My eyes locked on the console, to avoid meeting any others.
“As soon as you Defuse, you’re to test again. Set the puter to lock your fusion motors ... Painstakingly, I gave him the instructions I’d given the others. “Confirm, please.” I checked my watch. “Quickly.”
Tolliver watched from the second officer’s chair, his eyes boring into my back.
We had but two minutes left, before Sandra Ekrit would stop caterwauling. At last, Kevin’s response. “Ready to execute. Please, sir, could another ship call the fish if we can’t get away from them?”
I gripped the caller. “Of course, Kevin. One will be standing by. Just let us know.”
Tolliver stalked from the cabin.
“Very well, exec—Kevin, you remember Dustin Edwards?” I didn’t know why I blurted that.
A long moment, while the last grains of time slipped through the hourglass. “Of course, sir. All the time.”
“I do too,” I said gently. “Execute.”
Five Fusers left, and Lord God knew how many fish. “Mr. Boland, general call on fleet circuits. Each ship in Home Theater of Operations is to report the number of fish in their sector.”
The boy made as if to rise. “Aye aye, sir. Shall I tell Mr. Tolliver you asked him to do it?”
“You make the call on our behalf.”
His chest swelled with pride. “Aye aye, sir!” “Fuser One to Trafalgar, Midshipman Ekrit reporting. The fish are gone!”
So she’d survived. “Prepare to repeat testing maneuver in approximately eight minutes. We’ll send the signal to execute.”
It would be a while before she acknowledged.
It was Trafalgar’s turn to summon the aliens.
“Carry on, Mr. Boland.” I left the comm room, settled myself in the bridge, placed my hands on the thrusters. “Mr. Tenere, we’re going to caterwaul at sixty percent. Don’t stop before I give the order.”
The middy’s voice was strained. “Aye aye, sir. Ready at your command.” No protest. I felt strangely grateful.
“Commence.” I tensed, eyes glued to the screens.
Edgar Tolliver slipped into the second officer’s seat. “I would have liked someday to see Vega.”
I grunted.
He asked casually, “Do you know how much I hate you, at times?”
“Only at times?”
“Yes, but this is one of them.” His stare was defiant.
I wiped imaginary spittle off my cheek. “I know.”
He flushed. “You deserved that.”
“No, Edgar. Much more.”
The speaker blared. “Fuser One to Trafalgar.” Sandra Ekrit. “Sir, we barely survived the last attack. Whatever you’re trying doesn’t work. I can’t hear what you’re telling the other boats but—”
“Obey orders, Midshipman!” I forgot the damned time lag.
“—sending the fish in a circle from one Fuser to another will just get us all killed for nothing!” Her voice rose. “Sir, as chief officer I can’t endanger the boat—”
Tolliver’s voice cracked like a whip. “Fish, a thousand kilometers!”
“I see them.” My back was stiff from tension, but there was nothing we need do. Not at a thousand kilometers.
Alarms clanged. Tolliver grated, “Seven, eight ... eleven fish! Port, very close, aft, two hundred meters—”
I slammed down the port thrusters. The screen reeled.
“More of them at—”
They were upon us, and I had no Fuser ready to call them away.
I tried to plan while maneuvering. Either seemed too much effort; together it was impossible.
“Look at the bastards!” Tolliver.
I fired thrusters with desperate urgency, trying to maneuver the ungainly vessel like an electricar. If I wasn’t careful I could drive the ship into one fish while trying to escape another. If I did, we were finished.
Tolliver’s hand tugged at my arm. “Please. Let me!”
I recalled Hope Nation, and a missile leaping toward our heli. “Now!” His hands leaped for the controls.
I grabbed the caller. Eduard Diego was closest, in Six. “Trafalgar to Fuser Six! On my command, Fuse to the following coordinates.” I punched up Sandra Ekrit’s location at twenty-five million miles, outside the B’n Auba Zone. I read off the string of numbers.
“When you Defuse, immediately commence Fusion test at sixty percent, and continue for eight minutes. Acknowledge.”
His reply would take nearly a minute. The stars spun crazily under Tolliver’s evasive maneuvers.
I switched back to Fuser One’s frequency. I had a weak link to repair. “Very well, Ms. Ekrit, you’re right. Fuse back to us and wait for further orders.” I fed her the coordinates. “Acknowledge and execute.” I spun to Tolliver. “I’ll need about half a minute’s notice to the Diego boy. How many are there now?”
“Look at the frazzing screen!”
A reproach died in my lips. The simulscreen was blotted by dozens of encroachments, many breathtakingly close. Each moment brought more. Tolliver maneuvered to starboard of the main mass, but, as in Arcvid, the enemy could pop onto our screens anywhere without warning.
The delayed response from Six. “Midshipman Diego reporting. Orders acknowledged. Standing by to Fuse. Please, sir, don’t make us—” A second’s hesitation. “Standing by, sir.”
How many fish? Sixty. No, eighty at least. If we—“LORD GOD PRESERVE US!” I flung my arms over my face. A blowhole filled our screen. Tolliver slammed our nose thrusters to full, but our inertia was considerable.
A knock at the hatch. “Sir, Cadet Boland reporting. They—”
“Hang on!”
We glided toward the fish. I braced myself for collision. Damn it, why hadn’t we gone to suits? Without them we’d have no—
Meters from our prow, the fish disappeared. I gaped.
Tolliver grinned tightly. “It doesn’t like our hydrazine.” Our forward thrusters had squirted directly into it.
I took a much-needed breath. “Go on, Cadet.”
The words tumbled out of Boland’s mouth. “I talked to the warships and they gave me numbers, about eight hundred fish still in the theater but maybe some ships are reporting the same ones, can I go now, please?”
I glanced over my shoulder. The boy’s glazed eyes were riveted to the screen.
“Dismissed, Robert.”
Tolliver spun us to port. “Sir, you’d better tell Mr. Diego ... His voice faltered.
I reached out, shut off hysterical alarms, gazed in awe at the screen.
U.N.S. Trafalgar floated within a vast armada of fish. A kilometer from us drifted a sub-planetary body, so huge I would have lost perspective except for the attending aliens, some two hundred of them. A few squirted propellant from their blowholes, and glided toward us.
“Christsir what now?”
As if I had all the time in
the world, my hand crept to the caller. “Nothing, Edgar. Don’t move us.” When I spoke my voice was hushed. “Trafalgar to Six. Midshipman Diego, execute. Confirm and execute!” I reached out, slid my finger down the line down the screen, turning off our fusion drive.
Mechanically Adam Tenere, in the Engine Room, said, “Confirm Defuse, aye aye.”
“They’re still coming.” Cautiously, Tolliver fired a gentle squirt. We drifted astern, backing away from a dozen fish.
“In a few seconds they’ll hear Mr. Diego.” The mass of fish was staggering. Could Fuser Six hold out until I could arrange another boat to call the alien flotilla?
A screen light blinked out. Then another. I held my breath. More pinpoints of light went dark.
The fish were leaving.
A new blip, twenty thousand kilometers distant. More fish arriving or—my fingers punched the keys, querying our puter. Metal.
A familiar voice. “Fuser One to Trafalgar, Midshipman Ekrit reporting. Sir, I’m sorry if—”
“Belay that, Middy, no time.” I ground my knuckle into my forehead, searching for a way. “Ms. Ekrit, Fusers Four and Seven report false readings from their external fusion tube gauges. Our testing may have melted the wires. Who’s in your engine room?”
“Two cadets, sir. Bonhomme and Farija.”
“Send them Outside—no, I can’t rely on them. Do you see any fish at the moment?”
“Only near you, sir. They’re forty thousand kilometers from us.”
“If I sent you out to do a visual, how fast could you get back in?”
“I’m pretty good on the footholds, sir.” Her tone was confident.
“We need to know if the sensors are reliable. Get suited. Put all your cadets at the bridge console except the two in the engine room. I’ll stay on Fuser frequency; they can communicate with you via suit channel.”
“Aye aye, sir. What am I looking for?”
“Any evidence of bad connections or overheating. You can’t Fuse with bad sensors.”
“Yes, sir. Give me a minute to finish suiting. Sir, am I in trouble for countermanding your order? I was senior officer present and—”
A Fuser was a boat, not a ship, and she wasn’t a Captain. She should have known that. “No, Ms. Ekrit. I didn’t realize your problem. Hurry, will you? I need to send you back toward Earthport Station.”
“Aye aye, sir. Going to suit frequency.”
I closed my eyes, pictured her screwing tight her helmet, checking her suit clamps. Turning toward the lock. Slapping open the inner hatch. Reaching for the pump control.
“Commandant Seafort to Fuser One. Can you hear me? Identify yourself.”
In a moment, a nervous voice. “Yes, sir. Cadet Wallace Freid, sir. Cadet Chambers is with me. And Cadet Zorn.”
“Where is Ms. Ekrit?”
“The outer hatch just opened, sir. She’s Outside.”
Damn. I’d waited too long. “Can she hear us?”
“I don’t think so, sir. Not unless I press the intercom bar.”
“Call the two cadets from the engine room. Hurry.”
A muffled instruction. A moment’s wait. “The other cadets are here now, sir.”
“As your Commandant, I relieve Ms. Ekrit as your superior officer. Do you understand what I said?”
Tolliver whispered, “Watch the time, sir. Diego must be in trouble by now.” The screen was nearly empty of fish.
“Relieve? You mean she’s not a midshipman anymore?”
“She’s no longer in command. You report directly to me, and not to her. Acknowledge.”
“I understand, sir.”
“All of you!” I waited for the murmurs of assent. “Very well, tell Ms. Ekrit I said she’s to come in immediately, never mind the sensor.”
“Aye aye, sir.” A pause. “She’s coming; she told us to ask why.” I shook my head. Still questioning orders.
“Look at your console. See the hatch overrides?”
“No, sir.”
“Left upper corner, two blue switches.”
“Yes, sir. I see them now.”
“Turn on the inner hatch override. Acknowledge.”
“Aye aye, sir. Done. But she won’t be able to—”
“Is she back in the lock?”
“She’s just entering now, sir.”
“When you hear the pump, flip the outer hatch override.”
“But she’ll be trapped—”
I screamed, “Obey orders, Cadet Freid!”
“Yessir. The hatch just closed. I can hear a motor, it must be the pump. I turned on the override, sir.”
“Very well. Copy the following Fusion coordinates.” Grimly, I passed along the lethal figures I’d first given Seven, then Eight. I said to Tolliver, “Deceit. Always more deceit.”
“Justified, this time.” His voice was a growl. “It was outright mutiny.”
“And what I’m about to do?”
His face was grim. “Not justified. Under any circumstances.”
I took the caller, once again the Angel of Death. “Fuser One, the instant you Defuse, lock in your fusion drive for fifteen minutes and start testing immediately. Remember how? Good. You’ll be all right. I’m having three other ships Fuse at the same moment. The fish won’t know what to do.” By now the falsehood tripped glibly off my tongue.
“Aye aye, sir.” Wallace Freid sounded more excited than afraid. “Ms. Ekrit is pounding on the hatch. What should I say?”
“Nothing. I’ll deal with her later. Until then, let her wait in the lock.” A lonely death, helpless, disregarded by her shipmates. I flipped a blue switch in my mind, overriding the thought.
“She’s very angry.”
“Think of it as revenge for the middies’ hazing.”
His voice was more cheerful. “Aye aye, sir!”
“Mr. Freid, execute.”
Fuser One vanished.
We sat in somber silence. I took the caller. “Mr. Boland, check again with the fleet, and have Fuser Six stand by for further orders.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Tolliver, how are the others?”
“Fine, under the circumstances. Jerence Branstead hasn’t said much since he came at me.”
“He was right, you know. After I sixty-foured the Admiral you were duty-bound to obey.”
He shrugged. “I doubt anyone would object if I relieved you.”
“Do it!” Let death be on someone else’s head.
“No. I’ve changed sides for the last time. I suppose they’ll hang me with you.” He smiled, but not with his eyes. “You’ll be remembered, sir.”
I whispered, “I was a derision to all my people; and their song all the day.”
“What? Are you all right, sir?”
“Was I ever?” I took up the caller. “Trafalgar to Fuser Three. Respond.” I waited for Tommy Tsai.
Tolliver’s look was grim. “Sir, wait for Boland’s report from the fleet For all we know, the fish follow us until the last call and then go back to attacking Earth.”
“They can’t. The caterwauling drives them crazy.” I spoke without conviction.
“FUSER THREE TO TRAFALGAR, CADET KYLE DREW REPORTING. MR. TSAI IS IN THE ENGINE ROOM.” the boy’s voice was shrill. I turned down the volume.
“Copy the following orders, and inform Mr. Tsai.”
Tolliver persisted, “Damn it, you don’t know for certain, and you’ve already killed nineteen cadets!”
Help me, Lord, I know not what to do.
At last I stirred. “Tolliver, call Mr. Tsai and cancel Three’s orders.”
“They’ll be delighted. What now?”
“Plot coordinates for Trafalgar to the vicinity of Two.” In seconds, we’d be millions of miles inward.
“Aye aye, sir.” His fingers were already working. “We mustn’t Fuse, remember? We’ll attract them.”
“That’s all right. It won’t be for long.” We Fused.
I stared impatiently at the blank simulscreen
until we Defused. Now I could speak to Midshipman Keene without lag. “Edgar, plot coordinates for Two to nineteen point five million miles.”
Gritting his teeth, he bent to the keyboard. I switched frequencies. “Trafalgar to Fuser Two. Mr. Keene, turn your heat shields to full, and Fuse to these coordinates, on my order.” I read them from Tolliver’s screen.
The midshipman’s voice came crisp and sure. “Aye aye, sir. What then?”
The contrast to Sandra Ekrit brought a catch to my voice. Well, she was punished.
“The coordinates put you a million miles short of the B’n Auba Zone.” I made my tone casual. “For a ship of your mass, the Zone extends to seventeen million miles, so there’s plenty of leeway. In a few minutes I’ll send your return coordinates.” My eyes seemed to blur. I rubbed them. It only helped for a moment.
I rushed on. “After you Defuse, commence a test at sixty-five percent power.”
“Aye aye, sir.” For all Keene’s response, I might have asked him to pick up a holochip from the deck.
A fish appeared, kilometers away. I ignored it, my throat aching. “Mr. Keene, after you begin the test, orient toward the Sun and fire your stem thrusters continuously at full power until you reach seventeen and a half million miles.”
I waited for him to object. At length he said, “Aye aye, sir. Let me read back those coordinates, please.”
I confirmed them. “Don’t stop transmitting to us. Tell us how many fish come to you, and what they do afterward. Watch to see if they Fuse to safety. Remember to transmit constantly.”
“Aye aye, sir. Anything else?”
Tolliver swung his chair, his voice low. “Tell him the truth.”
“What truth is that, Mr. Tolliver?”
“What you’re asking of him!”
“I can’t take—take the chance.” I found it difficult to speak.
“For decency’s sake, you must!”
“If he refuses, how will we know what happens to the fish?”
“Thomas will do what you order!”
I said thinly, “You’d bet the human race on that?”
For a moment Tolliver was silent. Then, “Yes. Otherwise, we’re worse than the fish.”
I picked up the caller.
“Nick, let him sacrifice himself for you. Don’t send him to death with a lie. For the sake of your soul!”
He’d undone me. “Mr. Keene, execute!” I broke from my chair, ran to the comm room console.
Fisherman's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 4) Page 50
